Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Sahara: massive, splashy...and mysterious

On August 31, the Supreme Court ruled that finance schemes run by two Sahara companies were illegal and ordered it to repay as much as $4.5 billion (Rs. 24075 crore; $1 = Rs. 53.5) to up to almost 3 crore mostly small investors, plus interest. The final figures are still to be determined as some clients have already redeemed their investments, lawyers on both sides of the matter said.The case has shone a rare light on the unlisted giant whose interests range across finance, housing, media and entertainment.

Sahara has accumulated a string of trophies in recent years, including a stake in a Formula One motor racing team and ownership of Grosvenor House hotel in London. In July, it agreed to buy a controlling stake in New York's Plaza Hotel.

But its core client base is the towns and villages away from the shiny cities of modern India. There, Sahara sells investment products to often poor people in amounts as small as Rs. 2 a day. The company is a household name in India through its lead sponsorship of the national cricket team.

"Banks take eight years to pay what I get from Sahara in five years," Chaudhary, 40, said in Khalilabad, a town in Sant Kabir Nagar district in Uttar Pradesh. Like several Sahara customers interviewed nearly two weeks afterwards, he had not heard of the court ruling.

Spending power

Critics, including activist groups, say Sahara's investment products are designed to evade oversight by financial regulators and that it lacks transparency on the source and use of its funds, selling products to investors who do not understand the risks and ploughing the proceeds into real estate projects.

Under the scheme rejected by the Supreme Court, two firms owned by Sahara had offered bonds to small investors, promising, in some cases, to return three times the face value after 10 years.The court ruling that it raised money by "dubious" means follows another rebuke in 2008, when the RBI ordered a Sahara company to stop taking deposits from the public.

In a country where "black money", or undeclared wealth, is rampant, Sahara's size and spending power have long fuelled speculation over how the company operates.Sahara, headed by Subrata Roy Sahara, its chairman and self-described "managing worker", says it helps small investors outside the banking system and that it has never defaulted on them.

"Sahara agents motivate people who would otherwise spend the money on liquor, gambling, etc," said Guddu Pandey, a school teacher and Sahara agent in Uttar Pradesh, echoing an argument made by Sahara after the court verdict.The company did not respond to several attempts by Reuters to get answers to written questions. Roy was not immediately available to be interviewed, Sahara said.Sahara has not said how it will refund the money to investors, although it has said it is healthy and investors need not worry.

All in the family

The company's full name is Sahara India Pariwar, or family. Roy, 64, refers to himself as the guardian of the world's largest family, and espouses a philosophy of "collective materialism".At its headquarters in Lucknow, staff greet visitors by putting their right hand to their chest and saying "Sahara Pranam". Pranam is a respectful version of hello.

Roy, often photographed wearing a black necktie and vest over a white shirt, is based nearby at the showpiece Sahara Shaher, a sprawling gated complex of low white buildings and lawns where he lives and where the group holds an annual mass wedding for 101 couples who could otherwise not afford it.

Starting with capital of Rs. 2,000 in the late 1970s, Roy built Sahara into a giant that, according to its website, had assets of more than $21 billion as of April 2011.Roy is often described as a billionaire but he is not on the Forbes list of rich Indians. Sahara's website says no dividend has been paid for 34 years and no profit has been taken out of the company.From its north India base, Sahara has become a cashed-up global investor in hotels, sports and entertainment.

Last year, Roy teamed up with liquor baron Vijay Mallya of Kingfisher beer fame, paying $100 million for 42.5 per cent of his Force India Formula One auto racing team. It paid $370 million for a franchise in cricket's Indian Premier League.

In 2010, Sahara considered buying English Premier League soccer club Liverpool and held talks to buy the debt of film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Neither deal happened.Still, Roy is not typically bracketed with a corporate elite led by Indian families such as the Tatas, Birlas and Ambanis.

"If you look at the orthodox business community, they have kept him at arm's length," said Ashok Prasad, a physician, lawyer and academic who taught overseas before returning to Gorakhpur, the city where Roy started out.Instead, Roy is associated with Bollywood celebrities and, like many tycoons, is seen as having good political connections.

Last year, K.M. Abraham, then a SEBI board member, which had ordered that the bonds be refunded in the case that ultimately went to the Supreme Court, wrote to the prime minister alleging "undue pressure" from the then-finance minister and his office to deal leniently with high-profile cases, including Sahara's.The Finance Ministry and the regulator denied the allegations.

Sahara-sized

Sahara says its land holdings in India are more than 33,600 acres. Although not all is majority-owned, it amounts to more than any listed Indian developer.The group has two small listed units, Sahara One Media and Entertainment Ltd and Sahara Housingfina Corp Ltd, whose combined market capitalisation is $48 million.

In 2009 another group company, property developer Sahara Prime City Ltd, filed a draft prospectus for an IPO to raise up to Rs. 3,450 crore. The deal never took place but it came back to haunt Sahara when the prospectus attracted the attention of the securities regulator to the fund-raising scheme ultimately banned by the Supreme Court.

While an IPO of that size in India would typically see top-tier investment banks scrambling for a piece of the action, it was managed by four local brokers and Japan's Daiwa Securities SMBC, a small player in India. Several bankers at global institutions said they would not work with Sahara given concerns about governance and transparency.

"Their business model is not transparent. There are some grey areas," said the CEO of a large Indian bank, who like many people interviewed for this story declined to be identified given the sensitivity of the matter.
"Sahara has a lot of cash but we don't know where all this cash is coming from."Not that it seems to need bankers. Unlike many big, acquisitive groups, Sahara's in-built funding sources mean it does not rely on bank loans."Have you ever seen Sahara's balance sheet? Nobody has seen it," said a senior executive at another major Indian lender.

The people

Among many poorer residents of Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, Sahara has substance. Its sponsorship of the Indian cricket team in a country mad about the sport adds to its credibility in small towns.
"Sahara bank? That way," an elderly tea stall operator in Harraiya said when asked for the location of the Sahara branch office, erroneously referring to it as a bank.

The branch itself, up a flight of stairs in a nondescript grey concrete building, was bustling on a recent day.Sahara customers interviewed in Uttar Pradesh said they trusted the company, which has been around more than 30 years. Some had reinvested in Sahara products when they matured.Sahara operates through nearly a million agents, who sign up clients and collect payments, sometimes on a daily basis.

"I have never been to a Sahara office. The agent comes, does all the paperwork, and collects the money," said Anil Tripathi, a travel agent who said he had doubled his money with Sahara.Sahara has built a large niche in a country where 90 percent of the workforce is informally employed, half of households do not have bank accounts and loan-sharking is rife."The smallest of the small, the poorest of the poor—the banking industry is not able to cater to them," said Arvind Mohan, a Lucknow University economist.

The ruling

The issue with Sahara is transparency and regulation, critics and regulators say.For example, it does not always publicise its investment plan terms. A newer scheme, Q Shop Plan H, which is built around the group's new initiative to sell household goods directly to consumers, promises returns of about 135 per cent after 6 years, according to a term sheet that does not mention Sahara.Some agents said they were asked to try and convert holders of the outlawed bonds to the new plan.

Asked if the details of the scheme banned by the court were explained to customers, a long-time Sahara employee in Uttar Pradesh said: "We don't have to explain all that. The depositor only wants to know how much he would be paying and how much he will get back on maturity."The court ordered the money be repaid within 90 days, with 15 per cent annual interest, prompting speculation over how Sahara will scrape that kind of money together.

Sahara responded with a rambling, full-page newspaper ad assuring investors their money was safe. It also condemned any suggestion it had raised any so-called "black money" or sought any undue favour from any authority."People cannot accept Sahara's super-fast growth. All along we have been getting beatings and beatings from all authorities, whereas we should be appreciated," it said.

CHALAKUZHY PALLI

CHALAKUZHY MADOM

THEKKE PUTHEN CHURCH

To the Greater Glory of GOD ,The Thekke Puthen Church ,( called The St Mulk Thekke Puthen "Palli" ) dedicated to the Syrian Saint YOUHANAN MULK was built by the members of the CHALAKUZHY family led by the late Chalakuzhy Mammen Paulose . The Church is situated opposite the residence of the late Chalakuzhy Mammen Paulose at Kavumbhagom at Thiruvalla in Pathanamthitta District of Kerala State in Southern India.

This church was handed over to the Malankara Orthodox Church of India by the Chalakuzhy Family. The Church is now an independent Parish within the Niranam Diocese of the Malankara Orthodox Church owing alleigance to the Catholicose of the East and the Malankara Metropolitan. The members of this church were originally part of the Paliakkara Church parish .This Church was constructed during the period when the Paliakkara church was shut due to the legal battle between the Protestant Reformists led by Kovoor Iype Thoma Cathanar, and the Orthodox faction. The Indian Orthodox Church (also known as the Malankara Orthodox Church, Orthodox Church of the East, Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, Orthodox Syrian Church of the East), is a prominent member of the Oriental Orthodox Church family in Christianity, founded by St. ... This article describes different viewpoints about the history and tradition associated with the ecclesiastical position called Catholicos of the East, a title used by Eastern and Oriental Orthodox Churches to denote the head of a Church or a dignitary of the highest order. ... BACKGROUND The members of Paliakkara church before its foundation was generally of Niranam St. ...

This Church is unique and notable in the fact that it is arguably the only church under the Malankara Orthodox Church of India that is dedicated to a saint of SYRIAN ORIGIN----SAINT YOUHANAN MULK.

ABHILASH PAULOSE CHALAKUZHY

The year was 52 AD and the place was a small village in the northern part of Kerala named Palayur. Those days Palayur was a traditional bastion of conservative Hindus. A small group of Jews lived nearby in a hilly place and they had a synagogue there.One morning four Brahmin Hindu priests were conducting their ritualistic sun worship in the temple pond. They were from the four well known families of the area, Kadappu, Kalikavu (Kaliyankal), Shankuthiri, and Pakalomittom.They were standing half immersed in water and sprinkling water upwards chanting Vedic mantras to the sun god.Suddenly a Jewish ascetic came and stopped near where they were worshipping.

He was a visitor to the nearby synagogue and came from Jerusalem recently. The local Jews accompanied him.The visitor asked though his interpreter, what was going on. After getting their explanation he commented that it seemed the sun god was not accepting their offering, because the water fell back to the pond when they threw it up as an offering.The Hindu priests asked what could happen differently. Then the visiting Jewish holy man told them that he could throw the water as a supplication to the living God who is the creator of sun and all the other celestial stars, and his God would accept it.As the priests gave permission, he got down to the pond and worshipped God in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and then threw the water up in to the air, and to all present it seemed the water drops remained suspended in the air.The visitor explained to the Hindu priests that he was Thomas, one of the Disciples of Christ. He further told them that Jesus was the incarnation of God, the father.The convinced priests accepted baptism from the hands of the Apostle.

My grandfather had told me that our family is the direct descendents of the second Brahmin priest in the above story, the Kalikavu.There are thousands of other Christian families in Kerala claiming to be the descendents of each of these four Brahmins. According to this tradition, Christianity came to Kerala before it reached Europe or even Rome.In the 4th century, these families moved to another village, 200 miles south of Palayur to a village called Kuravilagad. St. Thomas hadordained some priests from these families. In the following years due to lack of scriptural books and the absence of connection to an Apostolic See, these groups of Christians went through a difficult period.In 354 AD, a bishop Mar Joseph and 72 other Christian families under the leadership of a merchant named Thomas of Cana emigrated to Kerala from Mesopotamia and Jerusalem.

Thomas of Cana ( where Jesus turned water into wine) was said to be a blood relative of Jesus. This immigration was a great revitalization for the local Christians. These 72 families were Jewish Christians, and their descendents to this day live in Kerala. They keep a separate identity from all other communities in Kerala. They are known as Kanaya Christians and are fiercely ethnic and practice endogamy.Christians of Kerala converted by St. Thomas accepted the Syriac (Aramaic) liturgy from this newly arrived group and apostolic benediction from the Patriarch of Antioch.

Hence, the St. Thomas Christians of Kerala are also known as Syrian Christians of Kerala. Syriac- Aramaic was the language spoken at the time of Jesus Christ in Palestine and it was also the lingua franca for communication among many nations of the East. Even today Syrian Christians use this language in parts of their liturgy.In ancient manuscripts the Christian community in Kerala is sometimes referred to as Nazaranis, meaning the followers of Jesus who was from Nazareth. Foreign travelers have also called them, Malabar Christians, as the coastal region of Kerala is called Malabar. Malankara is another name for the coast.

How reliable is St. Thomas tradition, and the story of conversion of my ancestors?The tradition is that the apostle first landed in Kodungalore on the west coast of Kerala in 52 AD. His first followers were some of the local Jews and then a few of the indigenous people. He traveled south establishing 7 churches in Kerala. He continued his missionary journey to Malacca and China. He returned to India and was martyred in 72 A.D in Madras where his tomb still remains.Many historians think that the ancient Jews of Kerala were the descendents of Jews taken in captivity by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.

Later when Cyrus, the king of Persia conquered Babylon he released the Jews, and some of them came to Kerala in 585 BC. There is enough evidence of a large Jewish colony in Kerala in the 1st century AD and there existed a continuous flow of trade between the Middle East and Kerala making the journey of the Apostle possible. Some of the early Christian converts of Kerala were probably from this Jewish community.The visit of St. Thomas to India is mentioned by many early church historians and also in the apocryphal book ' Acts of St. Thomas ' written by the Syrian Bardisan. (152-220 AD). Pantaenus, the governor of the school of faithful of Alexandria visited these Christians in 185 AD and left some references in his writings.Also, the presence of the Kanaya Christian community whose records indicate that their ancestors met St. Thomas Christians when they came to Kerala's shores in 345 AD is another strong evidence.In 552 AD, Cosmas Indicopleustus visited Kerala's coast and wrote about the presence of a Christian community there.In 1292, the famous Venetian traveler Marco Polo made the following interesting observation after a visit to the St. Thomas tomb in Madras." The Christians come here on pilgrimages from many places and gather some of the soil from this place where the Saint was killed, and this soil they take away with them to their countries.

Now, if anyone falls ill of a tertian ague, or any other fever of anykind, they give him a portion made of this soil. As soon as the sick man drinks it, he is well again." Marco Polo further attests that he himself took some of this soil to Venice and cured many people. (Travels of Marco Polo by L.F. Benedetto translated by Aldo Ricci).Though this treatment is not available at present at the St. Thomas' tomb, it is a revered center of pilgrimage and still annually attracts thousands from all around the world.In the same year 1292, the Italian missionary priest John of Monte Corvino, who was a special representative of Pope Nicholas IV visited Kerala Christians on his way to China and stayed with them for 6 months. He writes that he was quite surprised because these Christians had never heard about the Pope. Their allegiance was to the church of Persia and Antioch.Two ancient inscribed copper plates in the possession of Kerala Christians and another copy of a copper plate kept in Cambridge museum in England are further proof of the antiquity of this community.

Let me continue the story of my ancestors. converted by St. Thomas in the Palayur village ,and later moved to the village of Kuravilagad in the 4th century.In Kuravilagad, they built a church with the assistance from the local ruler in 350 AD. Bishop Joseph who came with the Kana immigrants in 345 AD consecrated this church dedicated to St. Mary.My Christian ancestors lived in Kuravilagad and the surrounding areas for another millennium as farmers, merchants, and professionals, and they were well-respected members of the society.(It is about them, Gibbon wrote in his ' Decline and fall of Roman Empire ' " In arms, in arts, and possibly in virtue, they excelled the natives of Hindustan.

Their husbandmen cultivated the palm trees, the merchants were enriched by pepper trade, and their soldiers preceded the other nobles of Malabar.")In 1498, when Portuguese merchants under the leadership of the great explorer Vasco Da Gamma came to Kerala, they were happy to see an indigenous group of Christians. But they soon realized that though these people were Christians, they were different from the Portuguese Christians. Portuguese were western Christians of the Latin rite who followed Pope of Rome.This was the period of inquisition in the Catholic Church and the Portuguese were very intolerant to other rites. Many local Christians became unhappy the way the Portuguese treated them, and many moved to the southern parts of Kerala, to be away from them. Kuravilagad was under the Northern kingdom, which was a protectorate of the Portuguese.The Portuguese bishop of Goa, Dom Menezes came to Kerala in 1599 and from June 20- 24, he called for a meeting of the Kerala Christians. 153 local priests and 660 lay representatives attended these meetings and they were forced to accept the supremacy of the Latin Church.

This is the infamous Synod of Diapore in the church history. Syrian Christians were forced to accept the hegemony of the Roman Church with the threat from the Portuguese soldiers and the power of the local king. Menezes visited many Kerala churches and burned much of the valuable ancient prayer books and other manuscripts because he considered them heresies.But as Portuguese were soon defeated by the Dutch in the Kerala coast, the local Christians who were waiting for an opportunity ,revolted against the Portuguese and the Latin domination of their church. The immediate provocation was when the Portuguese arrested a Syrian bishop Ahatulla from the holy land on his way to Kerala and took him to Goa as a prisoner. Somehow a rumor spread that the Portuguese drowned their bishop in the sea.On Friday, January 3, 1653, nearly 20,000 local Christians assembled in Mattachery, a port city near Cochin. They tied a long rope around a stone cross and touching the rope in a large human chain they took an oath that they or their children would never accept Portuguese or Latin hegemony over their church. This event is known in history as the Oath of Coonan Cross (leaning cross.) The people unanimously elected their Archdeacon Thomas of the Pakalomittom family as their bishop.

Later he was ordained by the visiting Mar Gregoriose, the bishop of Jerusalem under the Syrian (Jacobite) Patriarch of Antioch. At that time there were about 200,000 Christians in Kerala, and only 400 sided with the Portuguese.Soon Rome reviewed the situation more closely and started a conciliatory approach towards Syrian Christians. The Pope decreed that those who wanted could continue to practice the Syrian rite and liturgy. The Pope also sent an Italian bishop to Kerala and ordained a cousin of Arch Deacon Thomas from the Pakalomittom family as the first native Catholic bishop of Kerala.His name was Parampil Chandy Metran, or Bishop Alexander DeCampo as western historians refer to him. This caused a large number of rebelling Kerala Syrian Christians to return to the Roman Catholic Church.

So for the first time there were two divisions with in the Syrian Christians of Kerala, one group following Rome, the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church and the other following the Jacobite Syrian Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch.There were several confrontations between these two groups at that time. In one of those episodes in 1666 when a Portuguese bishop tried to enter the KuravalagadChurch, it unfortunately turned violent. The local ruler supported the Roman Catholic faction. The members of the original 4 Christian families were divided between these two factions. The faction that was rebelling against the papal group left Kuravilagad and moved further south to the southern kingdom, the Thekencore.

Thomas alias Oommen was my ancestor on the paternal side who lived 10 generations before me. He lived during this most turbulent period in the history of our community in Kerala. He strongly objected the Portuguese hegemony and the Latinisation of the IndianChurch and he participated in Coonan Cross Oath of 1653. When the majority in his parish church, its vicar, and many of his relatives took pro- Papal position, Oommen Thomas was not prepared to compromise on his principles. If he had taken a position supporting the Portuguese and the Latin missionaries as many of his family members did, he could have avoided many of the financial and physical dangers.

He even dared to take a position against the powerful local king. Finally when he found that he couldn't be true to the faith and traditions of his fathers if he obliged to the Portuguese power, he left Kuravilagad with a brother and a sister and came to Changanacherry, a town in central Kerala. It was only a distance of 60 miles, but this short distance of travel changed the destiny for his descendents.In Chaganachery Oommen lived in a house near the present municipal court given to him by the Raja of Theckencore. Oommen's brother became a priest and served the church in Chaganachery. At that time the churches in Chaganachery and Allepey Thathanpalli were branch churches (kurushupally) of Niranam church. Later these two churches joined Roman Catholicism.Oommen had two sons, Kuruvilla and Mathen. The second son, Mathen moved to Thiruvella and became the founding father of the Chalakuzhy family. He later died in a smallpox epidemic.

There are many versions about the origins of the family name " CHALAKUZHY ". The most likely versions are : The word " CHAAL " in Malayalam refers to " a water channel " used for irrigation and the word " KUZHY " refers to " a low lying piece of land. " The first home of our ancestors may have been on a low lying piece of land which had an irrigation channel passing through it. The name may also have its origins in the words " CHALAI " which means " MARKET " in the old Malayalam vernacular. Our ancestors may have accquired a low lying plot of land which was at that time used as a market place and hence they may have been referred to as the family that lived in the CHALAI-KUZHY. These are , of course , stories , based on conjencture and there is no hard evidence to prove either version.

Mr Abhilash Paulose Chalakuzhy grandson of Late C P Ninan the nephew of Chalakuzhy Paulose Mathen and His Grace the Most Rev Dr Abraham Mar Thoma Metropolitan which has its roots at Chalakuzhy Madom in Thiruvalla town in Kerala.

Chalakuzhy Paulose Mathen (1890-1960) Pioneer Banker and founder of the Quilon Bank Ltd which merged to form TNQ Bank Ltd [co-owned by K. C. Mammen Mappillai(Owner Malayala Manorama,MRF)], Member of Parliament from Mavelikara Constituency to the first Lok Sabha(1952), ,Indian Ambassador to the Sudan -1957 and a close friend of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.His grand daughter Mariam Ram is married to N Ram(Chairman and Managing Director of "The Hindu" (Indian Newspaper)) and is the Managing Director of TnQ Books and Journals named after TnQ Bank.

Abraham MarThoma was known all over India for his burning passion for evangelism, for his zeal for spreading the Gospel through the length and breadth of India. He received theological training in India and Canada. It was during this time that the MarThomaChurch became well known in the Western World.He was consecrated Bishop in the year 1917 and he worked relentlessly as Suffragan Metropolitan for the spiritual strengthening of the Church and for its witness. He was installed Metropolitan in 1944 when Titus II Metropolitan passed away.He was born in an illustrious Orthodox family but his father passed away when he was very young and he was brought up in his mother’s house at Eraviperoor, a home which cherished the blessings of the reformation. Thus from his early days he was inspired by evangelistic activities.He was president of the Mar Thoma Evangelistic Association and the National Missioanry Society. Even though he was suffering from acute diabetes for many years, he went on working with the motto: “it is far better to burn out than to rust out”. The Abraham Mar Thoma Bible institute established for the training of voluntary evangelists in the Church was named after him. He was called to eternal home in 1947.